The Bottineau pioneer. (Bottineau, N.D.) 1885-1895, 1887-11-03
. POWDER MINE HERO.

"a POWDER NINE HERO.
How d Soldier RIsked He Life In
R0IlghtIng the Fuse On the Very
Edge Of the Mine at Petersburg.
Sometimes bravery is an impulse;
sometimes it develops slowly and ut
last a crisis brings out the mettle and
proves it heroic. The hero OF the
mine at the Petersburg Siege was a
simplel,earted man, too@modest to
seek the post OF honor and danger,
but in the course OF his simple duties
he walked cody into the jaws Of
death. ssss
When the civil war alarm burst up
on the country, in 1861, the miners
of the upper schuylkin region, in the
mountains of Pennsylvania ,madesup a
regiment, the Forty-eighth Pennsyl-'
vania Reserve. In the ranks Of COM
panyt X was Harry REESE, q young.
man without pr%etensions. but filled.
with that quiet ardor that does not
flash and fade. The Forty-eighth
served in the early battle of Virginia
and in the Southwest, in Mississippi
and Tennessee and when the siege Of
Petersburg began, in. June, 1854, the
ranks Of It's Thousand stalwart miners
had been thinned out by bullets and
the hardships, Of camp and marchto
a couple Of hundred, and these,
though brohzed and soldierly-looking,
were mott men of 1861 for fever
and p~rivation make waste with the
strongest bodies. s%s 5<s~@ti5
Reese was yet but a common sol
dier, although he had won the chew
rons~ ora sergeant, one rank below an
Office. When Grant. broughtthea army
to the trenches before Petersburg that
summer the ten little bands of the
Forty-eighth, numbering about twen-
ty men each, We're placed in the front
line, opposite the most Important
fort the Confederates had for the, pro-
lection of the city. It had cost our.
army fifteen Thousand men to get up
near thatfort, and if it could be de-
stroyeds it was believed that we could
march into Petersburg. We had
spent ten days trying to- carry the
position by regular assault. and at the
rate we we're losing men we could
throw them all away and make no
progress. These miners were so far
front that they could hear the enemy
talk in their works, and one day,-or
night, rather, q sort OF neighborly.
council was held in the camp OF the
Forty-eighth, and some one proposed
to destroy the stubborn stronghold
that blocked the way by digging a tun-
mel from their works to a point right
under the.fort~ and exploding a pow
der magazine there that would teal
all above it to. ruins. 1t all was
buster to. begin with, but Sergeant
Reese caught up. the idea earnestly.
He fixed upon a plan and laid it be-
fore his superiors, promising that the
actual LABOR of the mine should be
|. performed at all hazard. Finally he
enlisted the colonel OF the regiment,
and that officer, being an engineer,
approved the scheme and had sufi-
Gent influence to get permission from
headquarters to begin. the tunnel.
But it was permission only. The
higher powers did not furnish nipple.
ments nor extend any encouragement.
Reese and about q, score OF his fellows
took some common. camp tools, with
empty cracker boxes for barrows,
and dug the earth in small quantities
and at night carried 1t away out OF
sight of Che enemy. As the tunnel
grew in length the work became more
difficult. There: was greater bulk of
earth to conceal, and the shaft was
dark and close. It would not do to
open al air shaft to the surface above
them, because the Confedrates who
occupied the ground would discover it
and defeat the scheme.
The space between the Union and
Confederate lines under which they
were tunnelling was occupied with
sharpshooters, and all day and at
night, wheneversthe air was clear, the
bullets did their deadly work when.
ever q soldier exposed q target. The
amount of matter taken out of the
excavation was $1,000 cnbic feet,
over 500 cubic feet for every rod, and
all of this had TO be concealed as East
as it came out BY filling il into little.
ravines and sunken spots behind the
works. And then the movement had
ITO be held g. secret away from all
Union 'soldiers that were not Tin the
mining party, because these men were
frequently captured on the outposts.
and the enemy could force some
weak prisoner to let out his secret in
formation. ;
,4The fear .deteetion~sfrom@t the
ground overhead also compelled the
men to work in the close shaft with
out air from the surface. The small
est aperture could not be made over
head without danger OF its being found
by some Confederate scouts Or pickets.
All of the fresh air let into. the tunnel
came through a wooden tube running
from the mouth OF the shaft and hav--
ing q partition so arranged asto carry
a foul air currentsaway andAbring in 8
supply of fresh air, and the circulating
movement was kept up by a fire burn,
ed constantly at the mouth of the
shaft to get the air in motion. This
contrivance was q help, but for all
that the miners became faint from the
fatigue and foul ali, and the hard work
disabiedsthem in about two hours
and they had to 60 into the tunnel in
reliefs and be cheered and encouraged
at every step, i had looked easier
on thesstartl than it really proved to
be to run a shaft SO far in the earth
without ventilation and without me-
chanical appliances. j
The soul Of the enterprise, at this
hr,,r of diccoY,roonpnopf ,uoo RoosoBH